Sustainable Tourism in Svalbard: A Balancing Act

Sustainable Tourism in Svalbard: A Balancing Act (BalancingAct) is a collaboration between an interdisciplinary team of scientists and two tourism organizations, the Association of Arctic Expedition Cruise Operators (AECO) and Visit Svalbard. We focus on how the tourism industry can create new and sustainable products in the light of a changing Arctic. Climate change is affecting the tourism industry in Svalbard mainly through reduced sea ice, shorter winter and longer summer seasons, and increased precipitation. The industry operates within a strict national wilderness management policy, and the forthcoming revisions to these regulations will have consequences. BalancingAct shows how policy and governance are shaping economic opportunities while also protecting the wilderness and reducing greenhouse gases. By bringing together diverse scientific disciplines and expert practitioners we co-produce actionable knowledge to address the consequences of climatic and societal change, understand policy, and seek innovative solutions to sustainability challenges. Many did not survive the COVID-19 pandemic despite national economic support, but the market is bouncing back. It is clear as that smaller expedition cruise tourism vessels are the segment with the highest growth in Svalbard. The reduced sea ice enables marine traffic in new places, which may increase pressure on terrestrial ecosystems. Tourism is an important driver of change in Longyearbyen, and the industry has an important role in ensuring a viable community. Therefore, we study local attitudes towards tourism, and whether and how these have changed because of the Covid-19 pandemic. By combining and co-producing knowledge and data from tourism organizations, experts, and science we gain insights into how Longyearbyen residents view the tourism sector and its broader role in Svalbard. Our workshop on future scenarios, highlighted local narratives of potential futures and local perceptions of environmental hazards, human safety and emergency responses, attitudes toward tourism development options, and relationships with visitors. In a survey, we have solicited the attitudes of Longyearbyen residents towards current and future tourism. While we identify a diversity in attitudes across the population, the community is positive towards tourism. A significant portion of the residents think that the tourists may increase their environmental awareness through visits to Svalbard and that tourism contributes to improved air services for everyone, and other services in Longyearbyen. It is a widely shared notion that tourism leads to environmental degradation and has a negative influence on certain aspects of life in Longyearbyen. Furthermore, there are mixed opinions among the residents about the role of tourism as one of the key economic pillars of the future. Our literature review on the knowledge status of how climatic and environmental change may affect tourism in Svalbard is supplemented with interviews with tour guides and leaders in nature-based tourism. Even though the climate is changing fast it does not seem to affecting the industry negatively. Plans include concentrating tourism activities around Longyearbyen, which increasingly is exposed to natural hazards. Climate change will exacerbate these hazards in the coming years, which challenge this strategy. For example, floods may destroy the roads and infrastructure and increased snow avalanches may significantly affect skiing, dog sledding, and snowmobile trips. In our review of the detailed environmental regulations for Svalbard, we find conflicts and internal inconsistencies in the regulations for nature conservation, area access and passage, and tour operator requirements. The regulations do not have any specific business development objectives and goals or acceptable limits of environmental and social change in place. These factors may highly likely narrow the “action space” for the tourism industry. We are approaching sustainable tourism and policy demands from an experimental point of view, with the knowledge that the notion of sustainable tourism is contested in the literature. BalancingAct is testing whether and how it is possible to co-produce knowledge for sustainability. The increasing attention to sustainability and ways to reduce the carbon footprint is a challenge for tourism organizations and operators who strive to maintain a viable business and also address a reduction in GHGs and ecosystem conservation. Tourism organizations suggest that visitors can become engaged in community-based activities. They might gather plastic waste along beaches, contribute to community events, and participate in scientific data collection. The development of new and sustainable tourism products is an explicit goal of BalancingAct, and we are organizing a workshop in Longyearbyen to discuss potential solutions, including the combined sustainability of Longyearbyen and the tourism industry.

Sustainable Tourism in Svalbard: A Balancing Act, is a collaboration between two Longyearbyen-based tourism operators, AECO and Visit Svalbard, and researchers. The team will investigate how the local tourism industry can create new and sustainable opportunities as it responds to transformative societal and environmental changes while maintaining a viable community in Longyearbyen and protecting Svalbard’s wilderness. The demands and pressures facing tourism are driven by Norwegian national policy goals for Svalbard, international processes such as the Sustainable Development Goals and Paris Agreement, climate change, and local attitudes towards tourism. We will assess the action space that is emerging when the tourism industry balances different demands and pressures and provide new insights into the degree to which policy and governance enable or constrain economic opportunities and wilderness protection. Findings from our assessments of how policy and governance, current and future climate change, and local attitudes may affect the tourism industry will be instrumental in developing sustainable tourism operations and products. Such products may include tourists being involved in environmental and community-related activities, and activities where tourists may gain an appreciation of the entire ecosystem and deeper appreciation of the function of Earth systems that may precipitate changes in attitudes about their own lifestyle choices. The project will contribute to Svalbard policy discussions with suggestions for how policies may have to change to ensure tourism-related economic growth while the local and national government anticipates and navigates rapid changes. The co-production of knowledge for transformation and sustainability has relevance beyond Svalbard and will inform conceptual and theoretical development. A Summer School for Ph.D. students and Post-Docs will be organized to address the multiple demands and opportunities for future sustainable tourism.